Abstract
This paper seeks to report developments in "ToK" (the Theory of Knowledge) and, where feasible, apply them to long-standing problems in physics. One key issue is to explain the nature of observation/perception, and hence criticize the 1900s' emphasis on experimental observation as harmfully overzealous empiricism. Meanwhile theory (and hidden-but-indispensible processes) have both been undervalued and their processes misunderstood. Much of the impetus for this work came from the late Professor J.Piaget, best known for the impact of his work on developmental psychology; but he also argued that similar principles apply to society-as-such (including the collective scientific-world) — and that amounts to a new approach to "Scientific Method" which has been used with apparent success in the biological sciences closest to physics, including neurophysiology. The account concludes with a brief application of this approach to two old problems in physics (Special Relativity, and Wave/Particle indeterminacy) — meanwhile noting other work which seems to have produced plausible models by actually breaking those “taboos” criticized here.
Robert R. Traill